6.28.2009

Theme: "End of the Road" — Theme answers are familiar phrases that begin with a word that can come after the word road in another familiar phrase.

Theme answers:

23A: Device using pulleys (BLOCK AND TACKLE) [roadblock]. I thought this phrase had something to do with football.

39A: 1957 novel with the working title "The Strike" (ATLAS SHRUGGED) [road atlas]. Never read it. Never really even thought about reading it. Not sure why.

47A: Plan likely to fail (HOUSE OF CARDS) [roadhouse]. Great clue.

64A: Dance, facetiously (TRIP THE LIGHT FANTASTIC) [road trip]. Was this always a facetious phrase? Or did it start out sincere and become facetious?

83A: Break in (SHOW THE ROPES) [road show].

90A: Though not yet in force, one was adopted by the UN in 1996 (TEST BAN TREATY) [road test].

112A: One who's halfway home? (RUNNER ON SECOND) [roadrunner]. One of the coolest looking birds ever.

Solid theme, well-executed. I guess KILL BILL was too short to include. Or something. Sometimes I get really bogged down with the Sunday puzzle because it's just so darn big, but today was a real methodical solve for me. Just kept plugging away at it steadily and it all pretty much fell together.

Crosswordese 101: Speaking of Sunday puzzles being so big, that means there are generally several solid crosswordese answers, and this puzzle is no exception. It was tough to narrow it down, but I've decided to go with TOR, which is clued today as 40D: Rocky peak. That's gonna be your go-to clue for TOR, but other words you want to watch out for are craggy, pinnacle, hill, and outcropping. Anyone out there ever used this word in conversation? Or heard it used? I sure haven't.

Other:

21A: Tide alternative (ALL). Laundry detergent!

26A: Self-conscious question (IS IT ME?). This reminds me of the book by crossword-constructor-and-all-around-hilarious-woman Deb Amlen scheduled to hit the stores in 2010. It's called "It's Not PMS, It's You."

35A: Peruvian pack animal (LLAMA). Funny that we also see the DALAI Lama at 56A.

42A: Arid Israeli area (NEGEV). The word NEGEV is from the Hebrew root meaning "dry." This area does have an alternate spelling (NEGEB), which I've seen in a puzzle once (and only once, and the clue did indicate "Var." and, as I recall, I wasn't real happy about it).

59A: Film involving stage scenes (OATER). An OATER is a Western movie. I think this clue is (cleverly) referring to a stagecoach, which you would see in a Western.

88A: Actress Davis (GEENA). I had Bette at first. That's not the first time I've made that mistake.

104A: Like a good loser? (THIN). As in losing weight.

118A: '70s pinup name (LONI). Oh Loni. I believed you were the only thing standing between Burt and me.

121A: Driver's gadget (TEE). In this case, the driver is one who drives a golf ball.

1D: Possible result of big losses (DEBTS). I don't know. In our house the debts are a result of big shopping sprees.

9D: ASAP relative (STAT). Learned this one from watching "E.R." Does anyone know where it comes from? I'm too lazy to look it up. [HAha! At first I mistyped that sentence to say "I'm too BUSY to look it up."]

10D: Ind. neighbor (PAK.). Raise your hand if you thought this clue referred to Indiana. I sure did. But it's India, whose neighbor is Pakistan. Hey, you know who's from Indiana? That's right. Michael Jackson. I've been listening to him all day just waiting for an excuse to include one of his videos in today's post. So here it is.

30D: City SSE of Islamabad (LAHORE). Rex was re-working a grid one time and switched something out and put in LAHORE. I sent him an email that said, and I quote, "Haha! WTF is Lahore??" To which he replied, "It's only a city of about a zillion people (7 million) in Pakistan." (Pakistan!) So now you know.

34D: Signaled from across the room, say (WAVED AT). I thought winked at but it wouldn't fit. I guess I was trying to signal something a little different than what David had in mind.

53D: Suit basis (TORT). A tort is a wrongful act that can be the basis for a lawsuit.

54D: Org. probing for outer-space life (SETI). Learned it from crosswords. It stands for Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence. And yes, it's a real thing.

77D: Big stink (STENCH). I was thinking more along the lines of a metaphorical "big stink" and when I figured out the answer referred to a literal "big stink" it was a little jarring.

78D: Musical place, briefly (B'WAY).

83D: Ball user, maybe (SEER). The ball in this case would be crystal.

84D: Patricia of "Everybody Loves Raymond" (HEATON). Is this the same actress I recently confused with Brad Whitford's wife (who's on another show I don't watch)? Pretty sure it is.

86D: An orchestra tunes to one (OBOE). Ladies and gentlemen, Exhibit A for why you need to pay attention to the Crosswordese 101 lessons! Here's an excerpt from my June 22 analysis of OBOE: "Other than that, it's helpful to know that an orchestra tunes to it, ...."

106D: Texting device (CELL). I just know there are people out there who cringe over this adjective becoming a noun all by itself. "It's not a cell; it's a cell-phone." Doesn't bother me though.

115D: Jazz fan (CAT). I thought I was so clever knowing that Utah Jazz is the name of a professional basketball team! And a person from Utah is called a Ute! Okay, a person from Utah isn't really called a Ute, but it worked for me. Until it was, ya know, wrong.

Nice write up, PG. This was a very workmanlike puzzle for me. Just kept at it and suddenly it was mostly done. I struggled with the Ind. neighbor clue because I already had ??K, and there's no Indiana neighbor whose three letter abbreviation ends in K.

Gary Lowe, did your 3D clue really read "stuff"? It's "surf."

Lots of clever clues Pen pal?, Hair line, Like a good loser? Gets to the point? Liked LANCE just above STEED.

PG: STAT is an abbreviated form of statim which is Latin for "at once" or "immediately." We in the medical profession love to condense our verbiage. Why say something in 2 syllables when you can say it in one? I mean, c'mon...I'm a doctor and I'm far too busy to say 2 whole syllables.

I suppose STAT should technically have a period after it to indicate that it's an abbreviation, but in modern parlance it seems to have become a word unto itself. And besides, I'm a doctor and everyone knows I'm much to busy to write a freakin' period.

And let's not forget the sheer exhileration of speaking in monosyllables. Thus:

"Um nurse, could you please hand me those Metzenbaum scissors? I really need them right away."

I totally enjoyed this puzzle with its clever clues and good variety of subject matter. I too was stuck in Ind(iana) for a while before finally thinking of Ind(ia). Didn't know Negev or Lahore but they were "oh, yeah"s for me after I got them via crosses. "Final words" wanted to be eulogy (wrong) or epitaph (didn't fit). Thank you Puzzle Girl for the entertaining write-up and a big thank you to DWC for an excellent puzzle.

Nice puzzle! Of course I needed PG to tell me about the theme (I printed the puzzle out and there is no title). Never heard "trip the light fantastic", ever. I also had Ute and thought it was Indiana instead of India. I got the "thin" but kept on thinking diet with the 1d, and flab and skinfolds etc....For pen pal? I had ink for a while, but the very funny gleam fixed that.

great puzzle, also didn't get the theme until I came here... was pretty happy to come across 'trip the light fantastic' - got it without any cross clues! had to cheat to complete 'negev' (EOE wasn't much of a help!)

What the heck does EOE (43d) stand for?APU (79d) "Simpson's Kwik-E-Mart operator" is used a lot, so tuck that away in your gray-matter.I found 10d sort of tricky... seeing Ind. immediately triggers Indiana with me and not India.17d UNMADE for "Like a teen's bed, probably" got a real LOL from me.I really loved doing this puzzle...like the ROAD____ theme.Guess it's cuz I took that wonderful 100 day roadtrip on Route 66 last year. BTW, I just launched my Route 66 Flickr website with over 10,000 Route 66 photos. Check it out! The link is:

@GreeneThanks so much for the STAT explanation. That emphatic term is certainly used a lot on TV hospital shows and so I wasn't sure if it was actually used by real doctors.@PuzzlegirlThank you for an outstanding writeup for such a big puzzle. You certainly are devoted to entertaining us PuzzleNerds.

Love these Sunday puzzles! Not being much of a TV watcher, I missed APU (thought it was ABU--should have asked my son) and Heaton (thought it was Keaton) so I missed the "break in" clue...I was looking for something about "rob"...but it just wasn't fitting.